My 10 Worst Reads of 2018

Okay, loves, it’s time to start working on my best/worst/most disappointing lists of 2018! I originally was going to do these at the end of the year, but ultimately decided, for the sake of fairness, to wait until all of my 2018 reading was done!

Insert disclaimer here about how all of these are just my opinions, please don’t be offended, etc. etc.

All of these are books I gave 1 star in 2018. It was mostly a good reading year (my avg rating was 4.1!), so these are almost all of the 1-star reads I had (the ones I didn’t exclude were just ones I didn’t have anything to really say about).

This book was a MESS. It’s a YA horror about a girl escaping a cult, which sounded right up my alley, but, well… there’s a reason this book’s current GR average is 3.23.

There are endless plot holes, the characters are painfully unbelievable, and the protagonist is just gross in the way she treats people (and she never learns or progresses at all). On top of everything, this author actually commented on my Goodreads review at one point to argue with my rating and to say that I wasn’t being fair because she claimed her book was based on “true events”. She’s since deleted her comments, but yeah, gross.

I was super excited about this book because 1) it’s about a ghost hunter, which sounded so fun, and 2) it was my first ever New Adult ARC, which felt kind of cool at the time because I was pretty new to reading that age range.

Unfortunately, this fell flat in every possible way. The dialogue was so poorly written, the main character is annoying and awkward (like constantly acting as though she’s an “old maid”, and then we learn she’s only 21), the romance is… weird (and painfully unlikely), and there’s a ton of slut-shaming.

I think everyone knows that, besides TFIOS, I’m no John Green fan, but what most people don’t know is that I also really can’t stand David Levithan’s writing, so this was bound to suck, but it was required reading for my summer class.

Between the nonstop fat-shaming of a character named “Tiny” (ha, ha, ha, really clever, guys…) and the way one of the protagonists talks about girls (“I don’t hang out with girls who hang out with other boys“), and the really unenjoyable writing styles, I hated this.

If this tells you anything about what a disappointment this was, Kaleena and I both agreed that the most enjoyable part of buddy reading it… was talking smack with each other about it. 😂

Honestly, I think if I hadn’t seen SO MUCH HYPE go around for this book and seen it get so much marketing attention, I wouldn’t have been quite so annoyed, but the writing was mediocre or worse, the world-building is nonexistent, there are plot holes everywhere, and the big sapphic relationship it was hyped for? It’s an awkward insta-love between a girl and her stepmother. I dunno, man, that’s not what I expect in YA? 😂

I almost didn’t include this because I don’t really think anyone cares about it, but I had to include it because I just hated it. SO. MUCH. It was another assigned read for my class, and it left me scratching my head over why it was chosen at all.

It’s written in a really gross, over-the-top “country bumpkin” narrative, the protagonist is awful to everyone and never learns any sort of lesson (which, in my opinion, is a little negligent in a children’s book?), and it’s super ableist and racist at points. YIKES.

6. Hush, Hush — Becca Fitzpatrick

Y’all… I read this book SIX MONTHS AGO and still haven’t reviewed it. I didn’t realize that until typing up this point. 😂 I need to get to work on my RTC shelf…

Anyways, this was just awful. The writing was laughably bad, the main character was weird and vaguely “not like other girls” if I remember right, but the biggest thing I remember standing out to me is that the romance is so weird and the love interest is one of the grossest “alpha male” types I’ve ever seen in YA. He’s ridiculously controlling and not particularly concerned with consent and I just hated him a lot.

This was another assigned reading for my summer course, and, uh… why and how did this win awards? Like, literal award. WHY. This book almost made me swear off Konigsberg’s writing forever, no lie.

The protagonist is a straight kid obsessed with fetishizing and over-sexualizing his new lesbian bestie, despite knowing she’s a lesbian, despite knowing his behavior is gross; he can’t go a single chapter without making a joke about or reference to his own dick, either. The writing was the final straw, though, because it’s so bad and the sense of humor feels super forced and cringe-y.

Books like this, which I read in the last week-ish of the year, are why I didn’t write this list in 2018—because it wouldn’t have been the same without this… gem.

This is a poetry collection and the writing is weird and unintentionally hilarious at times (“time with you now feels / like a trip to Taco Bell; / great in the moment / regretful the next day”). More than anything, though, the worst part was getting to the end and realizing the entire collection was written to serve as an advertisement for a dating website. WHO DOES THAT?!

Oh, man. This was one of the cringiest things I’ve ever read in my life. It would have been absolutely hilarious if it hadn’t been so awful.

Actually, it was still kind of hilarious.

The sex scenes are awful and weird and kind of funny, but the “romance” is creepy and the dude’s thought processes range from eyeroll-inducing to downright rape-y and stalkerish. YIKES. Do not recommend.

That’s it! Those were my 10 worst reads of 2018. What was YOUR worst read of the year?

Post navigation

78 thoughts on “My 10 Worst Reads of 2018”

LMAO at Unfollowing You. I kind of had the same experience with Will Grayson. I just couldn’t get into the writing and it was boring at times. So, I just skipped to the ending was so lost to what had happened. I mean it’s understandable that I would be lost but still..
I’m sorry you didn’t enjoy these

I don’t know WHY I love lists like these so much, but I do. I was originally going to make a list like this, but not a lot stuck out! It was mostly minor disappointments rather than terrible reads, which I guess is a good thing. Unpopular opinion but my worst read was probably Stardust by Gaiman. Honorable mention to St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves.

I always feel simultaneously a little bit guilty and a little bit giddy over making them because sometimes it’s just fun to rant. 😂 But I’m glad you didn’t have too many stand-out bad reads last year! I’ve never read Stardust but I honestly don’t enjoy Neil’s writing in anything I’ve tried by him so far aside from The Graveyard Book. 😦

Exact same, I feel bad but it’s also so… fun?? Gaiman is definitely hit-or-miss for me. Some of his earlier works can be a bit problematic, too. I liked American Gods, but Anansi Boys has a rape that literally isn’t acknowledged as such at all?? Stardust came off to me as pretty sexist. But at the same time I adore Coraline. So I never know whether to read something of his or not, ha.

Oh yikes 😦 Yeah, I can see how that makes it tough. I adored The Graveyard Book and it makes me sad that it was the only thing I’ve liked from him so far. He has a story in the By Blood We Live anthology about a little girl vampire and it has so much explicit pedophilia and just… YIKES, so much cringe.

Ahh yikes! I was so excited to read White Rabbit, but now I’ll definitely go into it with some reservations. My worst read of the year was probably Ship It by Britta Lundin. I wanted to like it so much, but it was just so bad in so many ways. I rarely ever give 1 star ratings, but that was one of them. Great post!

Ahh that’s such a bummer to hear you didn’t enjoy White Rabbit or Rule, I had both of those on my TBR. But you’re definitely not the only one to have some negative thoughts so I’m probably gonna pass on those now. Loved reading your thoughts on these books! I’d say my worst read of the year was Circle of Stones by Catherine Fisher, I had it on my shelf for years only to finally pick it up and find out how absolutely terrible it was 🤦‍♀️😂💕

Awww, if you do read them, I hope they’re better for you than they were for me! And I’m sorry to hear about Circle of Stones, it’s such a pain when we have a book sitting there forever and then we don’t like it 😭

Loved your list! Note to myself – stay away from Rule. I only gave a 1 star review last year (Colleen Hoover’s Ugly Love). I’d say it was the year of great books, but it was more the year of DNFs for me. 🤣

My worst reads is already up on my blog if you’d like to check it out. I actually had ten. There were so many books that angered me. You really don’t realize until you start making these types of lists.

I like this way of wrapping up the end of the year! I hope you can read better books in 2019. After reading TFIOS, I wanted to love John Green, but then I read Paper Towns. His books are just so… anticlimactic and I’m not a fan anymore. So I’m glad I don’t have to pick it up now!

Thank you! Yes, huge same on John Green—TFIOS is amazing but everything else I’ve read from him has just been such a disappointment. One of my coworkers loved TFIOS too and swears his latest book is more along those lines so I might check it out since we have a copy at our branch and I can just grab it whenever.

I was lucky enough not to have any one-star reads in 2018, but a couple classic fantasies (The Owl Service and The Children of Green Knowe) did not impress me. I read Will Grayson Will Grayson back when it first came out – I like John Green alright but I generally dislike Levitan’s writing. Overall I didn’t like anything about WGWG.

I LOVE reading ~negative~ posts! The only book I’ve read from this list is Will Grayson. I enjoyed it when I read it, but that was a few years ago when I didn’t pay attention and critique books as much as I do now.

Yikes for Hush, Hush! I remember loving those books, haha.
But, in my defense, that’s a LONG time ago so who knows how I’d feel about them should I read them now.. That’s the thing with YA sometimes, especially older books. :’)

Right! Oh, I’m sure there are SO MANY that I loved as a teen and would cringe over now. 😂 Or, I mean, who knows! You might still like it, and I wouldn’t judge you for it at all. It just made me mad for some reason! 😂😂

Hahaha. Honestly, I’ve been curious to see how I’d feel when rereading certain books – like, Twilight and Hush, Hush and TMI. The latter I’ll find out this year hopefully. Not sure about the others yet. 😛